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Why checking out your skin could save your skin

Looking after your skin and checking yourself out regularly in the mirror is about more than just vanity. This is the best way to find a skin cancer early, and believe me, finding it early is SO important.

Skin cancer is one of the most preventable cancers in Australia. This is good news, as it means there are things you can to reduce your risk. Putting sunscreen on your face (and body) is certainly a smart way to go. Aside from avoiding the lobster look, you’ll also help prevent your skin looking old and dry ahead of its time (bonus!)

The other smart thing to do is to keep an eye on your skin. You see yourself every day, so you know if something new or odd-looking has cropped up. Case-in-point: this is the way most skin cancers are diagnosed. The person themselves finds something that doesn’t look right and take themselves along to the doctor to get it checked out. So while you might get a bit of stick about checking yourself out all the time, what you’re really doing is looking out for your health in the longer term.

So what’s so important about finding skin cancer early? Well, as is the case with all cancers, the sooner you get onto it, the less time it has to take hold and possibly spread. That’s right, though we might think of skin cancer as just a mole which can be cut out, sometimes it’s far more complicated. Some types of skin cancers can grow and become very serious very quickly. Unless you are keeping an eye out for changes on your skin, the first you might know of this is when your health is seriously impacted.

But it’s not all doom and gloom. Just remember, get to know your skin so you’re on top of anything new or changing, and get straight to the your doctor if you see something suspicious. Hopefully it will be good news, but you won’t know if you don’t take the steps to find out. So go on, check yourself out in the mirror right now.